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Student Lab Intern Develops Automated Plant Imaging System

Monday, 30 March 2015High school intern, Allison Tielking spent her winter break working with scientists in the Nusinow lab focused on increased yield through understanding daily and seasonal timing in plants. While Tielking is only a junior in high school at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School, she is already determined to support the advancement of plant science.

Since plants grow at different rates at different times of the day, Tielking was tasked with creating an imaging system that would allow the scientists to monitor plants 24 hours a day, even in complete darkness.

“When I described how I wanted the imaging system to work, I expected that it would take Allison at least a week to come up with a solution,” said Dmitri A. Nusinow, Ph.D., assistant member of the Danforth Center. “She came back the next day with the code written, a video on her iPhone of a working prototype, and the parts I would need to purchase. I was really impressed.”

Tielking’s automated plant imaging system allowed the research team to take pictures in both the light and dark. She developed an infrared LED light panel that could illuminate the plants without affecting their responses, similar to night vision technology that allows security cameras and soldiers to see in the dark. She then wrote a software program to control the light panel that coordinates illumination and imaging using a Raspberry Pi microcomputer and camera that can detect infrared light.

“I loved spending my winter at the lab because I learned so much about plant science and because I got to engineer something new to help out the Danforth Center,” said Tielking.

Once the system was assembled, she imaged the mutants along with many other controls for about a week and quantified the growth rates. She discovered that the mutant has an increased rate of growth in the dark at night, but does not grow faster during the day. This discovery helped the Nusinow lab formulate better hypotheses about how this new gene functions to regulate plant growth in conjunction with light pathways.

“Allison was a great addition to our lab this winter,” Nusinow commented. “She individually measured and analyzed over 18,000 data points to quantify growth differences in our plant lines. We ended up finishing the project with enough time for her to compete in the St. Louis Honors Science Fair, where she placed third among a field of 35 students.”

Tielking will be recognized at the Academy of Science 2015 Outstanding Scientist Awards Dinner in April. In addition, her work is going to be included in presentations and a publication from the lab. “Excellent work for a junior in high school,” Nusinow said with a smile.

“I have been given so many amazing opportunities and volunteering [at the Center] is definitely something that I want to continue,” said Tielking. “I want to learn how to program better, because I want to get closer to my goal of solving biological problems with engineering and computer science!”